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61st NHL All-Star Game
The 61st National Hockey League All-Star Game (also known as the 2016 NHL All-Star Game) was held on January 31, 2016 in Nashville, Tennessee at Bridgestone Arena, home of the Nashville Predators. This was Nashville's first time hosting the NHL All-Star Game. For this edition, the all-star game was replaced with a four-team, three-on-three, single-elimination tournament with one team representing each of the league's four divisions. The all-stars from the Pacific Division won the four-team tournament. Team captain John Scott (an enforcer voted into the game through a fan vote) scored two goals and was given the game's most valuable player award. Game Format On November 18, 2015, the NHL announced significant changes to the All-Star Game format: instead of two teams pitted against each other in one game, there will be three 20-minute games, each consisting of 10-minute halves with four All-Star teams based on the league's four divisions. The Atlantic Division All-Stars will face the Metropolitan Division All-Stars while the Central Division All-Stars will play against the Pacific Division All-Stars. The winners of these two games will then meet in the All-Star Game Final. The format for all three games will be 3-on-3. If a tie remains after 20 minutes, then it will go directly to a three-round shootout plus extra rounds as needed to determine the winner; there is no standard overtime. All-Star Rosters National Hockey League staff and associates voted internally to determine the rosters. Fan voting was altered to match the new divisional format. The voting determined the captains of each division with the condition the player plays in the division they captain. This change was likely due to recent exploitation of the older method. For example, the fan votes in the 2015 All-Star Game were dominated by Chicago Blackhawks players and Buffalo Sabres forward Zemgus Girgensons, who was voted in following a heavy campaign in his native country of Latvia. Florida Panthers forward Jaromir Jagr tried to get fans to not vote for him; at age 43, he stated that he preferred to rest during the All-Star break rather than play in the 3-on-3 format. Girgensons also stated that he did not believe that he deserved an All Star spot this year since he only recorded four points up to that point in the season. Following weeks of fan voting, the four captains were announced on January 2, 2016. The Atlantic will be led by Jágr, the Metropolitan by Alexander Ovechkin of the Washington Capitals while the two Western Conference divisions are manned by Patrick Kane of the Chicago Blackhawks and John Scott of the Arizona Coyotes. Scott received the most votes of any player, despite having only recorded one point in 11 games played with the Coyotes (Scott spent much of the season in the AHL, or as a healthy scratch) and scoring five goals in his entire career up that point. The situation was compared to Rory Fitzpatrick's All Star campaign in 2007, in which fans vote for a player who would not conventionally be chosen as an All-Star. Despite this, both Scott and the NHL honoured the results. Scott was traded out of the Pacific Division and demoted out of the league on January 15, 2016 in a move that sent Scott to the Montreal Canadiens, who in turn assigned him to the American Hockey League (AHL)'s St. John's IceCaps; the trade was expected to make him ineligible to serve as captain in the All-Star Game. However, the NHL announced shortly after the trade that he would be permitted to participate. The rest of the rosters were revealed on January 6, 2016 with each of the NHL's 30 teams being represented by at least one player even though technically Arizona was not represented due to John Scott's situation. The coaches for each division's team were determined by the teams with the highest point percentage in each division following the completion of games on January 9, 2016. The coaches with each distinction included: Gerard Gallant (Florida Panthers) for the Atlantic Division, Lindy Ruff (Dallas Stars) for the Central Division, Darryl Sutter (Los Angeles Kings) for the Pacific Division and Barry Trotz (Washington Capitals) for the Metropolitan Division. On January 21, 2016, the NHL announced the addition of celebrity coaches to each team. Celebrities included country music stars Dierks Bentley, Vince Gill, Charles Kelley and Chris Young. Injury replacements were announced on January 28, 2016 with Evgeny Kuznetsov replacing teammate Ovechkin, who was out with a lower-body injury and James Neal replacing Jonathan Toews, who was out due to illness. To replace Ovechkin's captaincy, John Tavares was awarded the "C". † Ovechkin was replaced by Kuznetsov due to a lower-body injury. ‡ Toews was replaced by Neal due to illness. Game Summaries East Game January 31, 2016 *Team Atlantic: 4 *Team Metropolitan: 3 West Game January 31, 2016 *Team Pacific: 9 *Team Central: 6 Final January 31, 2016 *Team Pacific: 1 *Team Atlantic: 0 All-Star Game Festivities Alongside the 3-on-3 tournament the NHL hosted several other events during the All-Star weekend. *2016 NHL Fan Fair *NHL Mascot Showdown *2016 Honda NHL All-Star Skills Competition Live musical performances by: *Corrina and Vince Gill (U.S. national anthem) *Lennon & Maisy (Canadian national anthem) *Lee Brice (pre-game performance) *Jennifer Nettles (second intermission) *Sixwire (house band) *Small Time Rock Stars (house band) NHL All-Star Skills Competition The competition was held on January 30, 2016 was be broken up into six events: Bridgestone NHL Fastest Skater, Honda NHL Breakaway Challenge, DraftKings NHL Accuracy Shooting, Gatorade NHL Skills Challenge Relay, AMP Energy NHL Hardest Shot and the Discover NHL Shootout. Teams Atlantic & Metropolitan combined to represent the Eastern Conference and teams Central & Pacific combined to represent the Western Conference. Fastest Skater In this event, four pairs of skaters raced each other simultaneously on parallel short-courses on the rink. The fastest skater in the head-to-head match-ups received the chance to skate a full lap of the outside border of the rink, in the direction of their choosing in an attempt to break Mike Gartner's record (13.386). The winner of each match-up scored one point, the team with the fastest skater scored a bonus point, and an extra bonus point was awarded for breaking Mike Gartner's record. Breakaway Challenge In this competition, competitors skated with the puck and attempted to score on the opposing team's goalie. Each competitor had two chances. The winner was judged on their presentation, style, creativity and flair. NHL penalty shot rules did not apply. The winner was determined by fan-vote through Twitter and was rewarded one point for their team. The winner, P.K. Subban donned a wig, black hockey-pants, an old hockey helmet, and a Jaromir Jagr jersey, skated in, and slid the puck into the net after initially hitting the post, completing his best Jagr impression with a salute to the crowd. Runner-up Brent Burns was joined by his son Jagger, and Sharks teammate Joe Pavelski and his son Nathan. Former teammates Cory Schneider and Roberto Luongo staged a mock argument in the net to leave it empty while Jagger got the puck from Nathan and scored. While all other lineups were submitted by the team captains, this event also allowed fan-vote via Twitter to secure a guaranteed spot in the event for an eligible player of their choice. Voting was open from January 26, 2016 to January 28, 2016. Accuracy Shooting In this event, competitors were positioned in front of the net and were passed the puck from two players situated behind the goal line. The players had to hit targets at the four corners of the net in the fastest time. The event consisted of four head-to-head match-ups, with one shooter from each team per round. The winner of each match-up scored one point and the player who hit all four targets in the fastest time scored a bonus point. Challenge Relay In this competition, teams of 14 players and 2 goalies were selected from each side to compete in a timed relay event which consisted of four relays with five challenges each: One Timers, Passing, Puck Control, Stick-Handling and Goalie Goals. Each player on the team had one skill to complete before the next player could start. The goal was to complete the relay in the fastest time. The team with the fastest time in each heat scored one point and the team with the fastest overall time scored one bonus point. Hardest Shot In this competition, players skated in from the blue line, and slapped a puck placed 30 feet from the net as fast as possible into the net. The event consisted of four head-to-head match-ups where each player attempted two shots, with the fastest of their two shots recorded. The winner of each match-up scored one point and the team with the player who had the fastest speed scored one bonus point. Shootout Eighteen skaters and three goaltenders from each team will participate in the three-round shootout, with each round using six skaters and one goalie from each team. Teams received two minutes per round, to score as many goals as possible. NHL shootout rules applied to each scoring attempt. One point was awarded for each goal scored, except for players one and three from each team who were designated "Discover puck players", and goals scored by these players counted as two. *''italics'' = Heat winner *'bold' = Event winner ** denotes record Category:NHL All-Star Games